


How Jaime Met Brian the Lad of Tarth

by Miss_M



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Crack, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-17
Updated: 2013-11-17
Packaged: 2018-01-01 21:01:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1048529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miss_M/pseuds/Miss_M
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It had to happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Jaime Met Brian the Lad of Tarth

**Author's Note:**

> This is what happens when someone asks Nikolaj a question and mispronounces Brienne’s name, [and then Tumblr runs with it](http://prinzessinfantaghiro.tumblr.com/post/67260205506/who-was-brienne-supposed-to-marry). I own nothing but the crackiness.

“Are you absolutely certain you’re not her?” Jaime demanded for the third time. 

“Yes, Ser Jaime,” the young man replied through gritted teeth, sounding exactly like Brienne. “I am certain.”

“Hmm.” Jaime kept looking the tall, strapping figure before him up and down, and down and up. Same height and shoulders, same ramrod posture, same perpetually outraged scowl, same freckles and hair and eyes… There could only be one pair of such blue eyes in the world. 

“I remain unconvinced,” Jaime declared at last. “Why don’t you pull down your breeches and show me your cock? Then I might believe you.” 

On second thought, he could have phrased the request better. For a moment he was certain she/he would hit him. The large hand squeezed itself into a fist so tight the skin on the knuckles turned milky white. 

“My cousin wrote to warn me of your ways, ser,” the youth said with a visible effort at civility. “You will not provoke me with such language.” 

“Funny, that is exactly what Brienne said to me when first we met.” Jaime grinned as the youth turned away stiffly and started marching toward where two horses waited tethered to a tree. 

Jaime followed more slowly, watching the youth’s back and legs. Same stride without a hint of womanly grace, not that that proved anything. Brienne always strode around like self-righteousness personified. 

“Aren’t you curious how I know so much about your cousin as to be able to compare you two out of your breeches?” Jaime asked cheerfully. 

The stride did not falter, although the tell-tale blush rushed up the back of the youth’s neck, which only strengthened Jaime’s suspicion that this was indeed Brienne playing a silly prank, and failing miserably at it. Or maybe the poor girl had fallen and hit her head, and convinced herself at last she was a true knight, complete with a man’s name… 

Only one way to find out. There was one thing he could say to her which couldn’t fail to produce a reaction. 

“Wench.” 

It came out more hissing taunt than word. Almost as loud as the hiss of displaced air when the youth’s fist rushed at Jaime like a warhammer. 

It felt like a warhammer, too. Jaime was certain of that, though he’d never been hit by one before. He even had time to wonder, in a dazed, distant sort of way, if he was about to forget his identity as well, convince himself he was Cersei or a traveling mummer. Small difference between those two. 

Jaime would have laughed, but blood poured out of his mouth when he opened it. Then the youth was there, kneeling on the grass beside him, cradling the back of his head in one trembling, shovel-like palm, while the other pressed the corner of a blue jerkin to his bleeding nose. 

“S… Ser Jaime,” the youth stuttered in a voice which sounded much higher and more girlish in his agitation. “F… forgive me… I….”

Jaime fought with the hand pressing the blue cloth to his face, managed to push it off before the youth accidentally smothered him. He spat blood on the grass. “My apologies,” he said, trying to move his lower jaw as little as possible. “Your cousin would have understood it for a jest, albeit one in poor taste, Ser Brian.” 

“I am no knight, ser. Only a squire still.” The young man blushed a warm pink, which did nothing to dispel Jaime’s lingering conviction that it was indeed the wench cradling him like a fallen hero in a song. 

“Please, Ser Jaime…” The youth stopped, biting his lip, compelling Jaime to close his eyes or the notion that two Briennes hovered over him, wavering in and out of one body, would have overwhelmed him. 

“Please what?” he asked, eyes still closed. 

“Please don’t tell my cousin about this.” That made Jaime open his eyes. For the first time he saw Brian for who he was, a lad, even younger than Brienne, ashamed and miserable. “Her letter was very specific that you were to be made welcome here on Tarth. If she finds out I…” 

He couldn’t even finish the thought, his ugly face twisted up in agony. Now that the lad was so close, Jaime detected the merest hint of straw-like fuzz on his upper lip, the distinct smell of a man’s sweat emanating from the blue jerkin. The wench never smelled like that, even smeared with blood and several days’ worth of travel dust.

Suddenly Jaime could see it in his mind’s eye, plain as the mild Winter day: young Brian dogging his older cousin’s footsteps, fascinated by her swordplay, astonished at her strength, her dreams of knightly valor filling his head with noble nonsense. And then Brienne went away to war, leaving Brian all alone, only to entrust him with a very important task, to make Ser Jaime Lannister the Kingslayer welcome on her beloved Tarth, the first time Brian had heard from her in nearly two years. And Brian botched it. 

“Help me up, there’s a good lad.” 

Brian heaved Jaime up to his feet so precipitately Jaime’s head spun, sea and sky briefly exchanged places, and he nearly vomited the way he had managed to avoid doing during the passage from the mainland. When he could open his eyes again without wobbling, he met Brian’s anxious expression with a red-mouthed grin. 

“Do you have taverns here on Tarth, Brian?”

The lad frowned. “Y… Yes, of course we do.”

“Good. I want ale to wash the taste of wormy ship’s biscuit from my gullet, and you must be anxious for tales of your cousin’s adventures since she left you.” 

Jaime thought he might save some of the sorrier parts of that tale till he knew Brian a bit better, but he was confident the lad would enjoy the part about the bear. A smile was starting to dawn on the lad’s broad, homely face when he understood he was forgiven, his honor in Brienne’s eyes in no danger of being tarnished. His blue eyes sparkled with it. 

As they untied the horses and mounted up, Jaime reflected that this might not be the last time the menfolk of House Tarth took a swing at him, if certain rumors about himself and Brienne had already crossed the Straits of Tarth, as Jaime had no doubt they eventually would. He might as well make an ally of young Brian. 

_And anyway_ , Jaime couldn’t help thinking as the lad pointed out the road they would take to the nearest village with an inn, _they both really do have the most astonishing eyes._


End file.
